Strategic privatisation: rehabilitating the Mozambican sugar industry

This article argues that the rehabilitation of the sugar industry in Mozambique cannot be understood without including the active role played by the state and government. It focuses on key aspects of why and how the Mozambican sugar industry was rehabilitated after 1996 with and through foreign direct investments. It challenges the externalist literature on Mozambique that has commonly argued that all policy decisions are enforced by the pressure of well-meaning donors and/or ignorant international financial institutions preparing the ground for large international corporations through neoliberal policies, privatisation and structural adjustment programmes. There can be no doubt that donors in general, international financial institutions, and international capital have had and continue to have considerable influence over economic and industrial policy in Mozambique, but externalist accounts of various persuasions have limitations and tend to present accounts of the Mozambican state and government solely as victims instead of active players.